


Regret

by marmolita



Series: Trek prompt fills [3]
Category: Star Trek: Deep Space Nine
Genre: Bajoran, Canon-Typical Violence, Child Soldiers, Drabble, Gen, Occupation of Bajor
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-10-26
Updated: 2014-10-26
Packaged: 2018-02-22 15:26:09
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 284
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/2512565
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/marmolita/pseuds/marmolita
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Kira Nerys doesn't remember the first time she saw a dead body.  She doesn't even remember the first time she saw someone get killed right in front of her.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Regret

**Author's Note:**

  * For [poehlersehlat](https://archiveofourown.org/users/poehlersehlat/gifts).



> Written for a prompt asking for resistance-era Kira. Not sure this qualifies for any warnings but it does describe Kira killing people when she was young.

Kira Nerys doesn't remember the first time she saw a dead body. She doesn't even remember the first time she saw someone get killed right in front of her.

She does remember the first time she killed, but the face of the man eludes her. She remembers being cold, being scared, huddled in the dark waiting for the Cardassians to walk into their ambush. She remembers how easy it was to trigger the phaser rifle, how fast the first man fell, and the second, and the third. She remembers being elated afterward, joy at the success of their mission, camaraderie with the resistance fighters even though she wasn't even old enough to be considered a woman by any measure.

She doesn't know how many people she has killed and she likes to keep it that way. There are some she recalls better than others -- the ones where she stabbed a knife deep into Cardassian flesh and twisted it, the ones where she watched their faces twist in rage and shock. She remembers the ones who begged for their lives -- there weren't many. They were Cardassians after all. She remembers the times she planted bombs that killed entire families.

But after all, in war, you can't afford to allow the enemy to have a face, to have a name, to have a life and a family. Too much empathy makes a weak and ineffective soldier.

Does she regret killing any of those people?

Not the Cardassians. Never the Cardassians.

She's not sure if she regrets it or not, but she remembers the names and faces and lives of every single Bajoran collaborator she killed. How many of them?

Even one Bajoran life is too many.


End file.
